No Deal….Yet 

Republican legislative leaders will soon draw up another budget offer for Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper after he presented a counterproposal in the state budget talks.  House Speaker Tim Moore confirmed on Thursday that Cooper sent a counteroffer to him and Senate leader Phil Berger earlier this week.  The two GOP leaders last week finalized internal negotiations on a state government budget and presented that plan for Cooper to consider.

Read more

Redistricting: Ready, Set, Draw!

There’s been a lot of talk across North Carolina about redistricting lately, and one question keeps popping up:  when will they actually draw the maps?  On Wednesday, lawmakers began drawing new electoral maps for North Carolina.  In earlier decades, redistricting went on behind closed doors.  But this year, redrawing the electoral districts will be done in public.  Members of the state House and Senate will use a process similar to 2019, when a court ordered lawmakers back to the drawing board to make new maps in the open.

Read more

Remembering Rep. Dana Bumgardner

Dana Bumgardner, who represented the southeast portion of Gaston County for more than eight years in the state House, died Saturday from cancer.  He was 67.  Bumgardner was in the middle of his fifth, two-year term in the state House representing District 109, and currently served as a chair of the House Appropriations Committee.  In a statement released Saturday night, House Speaker Tim Moore remembered Bumgardner as a friend and a colleague.  "Dana was a principled man who fought hard for his constituents in Gaston County. He was quick-witted, principled, and never afraid to speak up for what was right," Moore said. 

Read more 

Simply Pawsome!

North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis will host his traditional "bipawtisan" dog costume parade for Capitol Hill staffers later this month, an event that allows lawmakers on both sides of the political aisle to dress their pooches (and themselves) up for Halloween.  The annual event began in 2017 and was paused last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. "Senator Tillis has always had a very dog-friendly office and may have 2-5 dogs come in any given day," a spokesperson for the lawmaker tells PEOPLE. "In that spirit, Senator Tillis hosted the first “Bipawtisan Halloween Dog Parade” in 2017 so members of Congress and staffers on both sides of the aisle could come together for a cause everyone can unite for: dogs in costumes." 

Read more